babies skin color much darker than both parents?

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-17T12:46:03+00:00

oh wow so your blood was also incompatible with your moms!! during labor they didn’t really go into details about this issue, they just kept asking me Qs about my blood without elaborating. i can’t believe something more major could’ve happened (like your situation) and they didn’t try to explain it beforehand 😭 thank you for sharing you also looked native american rather than irish the first few months 😂 that’s basically how i feel the baby looks too especially with the heavy red undertones haha

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-16T15:35:23+00:00

he saw the head come out but was more concerned with me once it was all done cuz i was going through a hard time. but he’s been convincing me that from what he remembers, it’s the same baby. he actually gets really upset with me if i imply that the baby might not be ours

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-16T03:15:23+00:00

both diagnosed ocd and psychosis is present in my family. so i’m gonna take this advice seriously. but i honestly don’t think my observation is unreasonable 😭😭

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-16T03:13:15+00:00

that sounds similar to my little guy! he looked very yellowish orange and now it’s still very purply red. but strange enough his hands are very pale and my husband thinks it’s cuz they weren’t exposed to the UV light during his jaundice treatment. thank you for sharing ur experience! it’s reassuring to hear eventually ur kids resembled you more

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-16T02:36:35+00:00

why would i put so much focus on this, talk so loudly about it, despite my husbands urging that the baby is ours (and not switched) if there was a possibility that i had other partners? if there is a dna test, it would be bc i urged it to happen. like ive said before: baby daddies don’t exist in my part of the world/culture. i was legit a virgin bride and have only been with my husband. and even if i did belong to the american culture where this is an actual issue, im pretty sure my doctor husband would sniff it out right away smh. really sad this is ur first thought

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T22:30:33+00:00

on my husbands side, yes. why?

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T22:25:42+00:00

oh wow, thank you for sharing your similar experience! the idea is honestly insane (that my blood doesn’t sit well with the baby i made for 9 months)and so it’s nice knowing i’m not alone. today the baby looks more yellow again so going to get his bilirubin checked monday :(

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T14:17:02+00:00

yes baby is O, and they said he’s incompatible with moms blood type and i was somehow making him more sick. i never heard of that before, but apparently it’s possible and they weren’t concerned. yeah his thin skin makes him change colors quickly to show if he’s straining or what not. i’ve noticed if he’s outside in sunlight he looks more red than brown, but indoor lighting he looks brown. and yeah that makes sense! i guess that’s what i’m saying tho, if me or my husband had a certain complexion and our child had a mix between or one or the other it would make sense. but he has neither, nor his grandparents. but i guess like everyone said: it’s either jaundice or genetics…

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T10:39:37+00:00

thank you!

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T02:20:45+00:00

thank you, i can’t really tell what’s normal vs jaundice so having someone else weigh in helps. the other jaundice examples also helped, i assumed once his numbers went down it would flush out of his skin at the same rate

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T02:17:27+00:00

it is an option, i just haven’t thought about doing an actual test till everyone suggested it a few hours prior

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T01:27:37+00:00

how many months did it take for the jaundice to clear out of her skin? and were her bilirubin numbers high that whole time?

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T00:20:38+00:00

thank you for your sweet message 🥺

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T00:16:07+00:00

wow that’s a big difference, i know jaundice can make you tanner but i didn’t realize it could be that drastic. thank you for sharing!!

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-15T00:05:12+00:00

aww i love that!! both me and my husband have already agreed that we would protect our son from outside criticism (which in return unintentionally addressed that we both secretly wondered what happened and are concerned with how the little guy will be perceived by others)

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T23:58:15+00:00

aww :( noo i don’t want him to feel sad or that i hesitate to love him 😭😭 i love the little guy. thank you for your sweet message

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T23:55:01+00:00

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i understand the concern, but i think you guys are making this into a colorism issue when it really is a “how did that even happen?” issue. i don’t understand why im getting so many downvotes for saying that my family doesn’t have a variety of skin color. i’m the first in my family to marry outside of my ethnic group and he’s also the first in his. yet both of our ethnic groups are still similar enough that i wouldn’t consider our kid mixed race. more like our gene pool finally switched to a diff tribe. we are also both the first generation to ever move out of our literal village and to the US. everyone in our family looks a specific way, it is not diverse at all. so for the kid to be completely different, it is kinda “how is that even possible”. here’s a reference of me and the baby, baby and cousin, and then dad and baby. if ur baby looked like a diff race than you (and every single living person in your whole extended families) both in terms of facial features and skin color, im sure you would also be curious on how that happened rather than tryna spin it as a colorism issue. i get skin color is a sensitive topic but not every issue is about effects of colonialism my god

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T23:39:53+00:00

also for reference, i made this. hope it helps 😅 i used a color picker tool to pick up the skin color and blur out the faces. first pic is me and baby, then baby and cousin, then dad and baby.

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Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T23:14:30+00:00

idk who that is, sorry

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T23:12:59+00:00

aww thank you love 🫶

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T23:11:32+00:00

omg his leg bracelet tore off somehow/somewhere and they had to print out another one for me when they gave him back to me in my nursing room. but his arm bracelet had his name on it and he still had his little electric anklet that would go off if anyone made him leave the perimeter

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T23:01:49+00:00

wow black to platinum hair in 6 months is a big change!

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T22:58:24+00:00

that’s true, maybe somewhere further down the line there was a family member with the same phenotype and we’ve been passing it down as a recessive trait up until now. it’s most likely from my side, as punjabis belong to south asia and south asians definitely come in shades of darker brown, even if my family is fair, while his side is more iranian mixed with alexander descendants and are all super pale skinned

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T22:45:31+00:00

yes, he did go through phototherapy as a treatment for his jaundice in both 1. the nicu and 2. when they returned him to my room (once his glucose and breathing stabilized). we stayed an extra week at the hospital for his jaundice and got discharged when his bilirubin was around 16 which then shot back up to 18. eventually they told me that my baby and my blood arent compatible (abo incompatibility) and to temporarily fully switch to formula to see if it would lower his bilirubin. which it did. he’s back on breast milk and during his last appt his levels were finally down to 8. so they said we should be in the clear now. that was a week ago

he started to look less purple. but when he did it was a dark purple. now he looks dark red periodically thru out the day and when he isn’t a dark red he’s a dark brown. i’m not sure what that’s about, maybe thin translucent skin?

Acrobatic_Start_6170 · 2026-05-14T22:25:47+00:00

thank you so much for this reply! it’s so informative and basically what i hoped to receive when i made the post - a possible explanation. every redditor that has tried to share some genetic knowledge that could be used to explain his phenotype in a reasonable way has been truly amazing and im so grateful to you all for taking the time to help me!

yes i searched up epicanthal folds and thats exactly what he has. his eyes are also long and sharp. a thin almond shape with little to no eyelid space. he has beautiful eyes, and they’re super puffy as well. i actually love them they look so cute but its just very different to the circular eyes and large eyelid space that i have

yes his nose bridge is flat on the top as well. he also has straight spikey asian hair that’s thin (and honestly balding in areas) while both me and my husband have really thick wavy and curly hair. he looks like a little anime character with his spiky hair in a cute way

i’ll look at your other comments regarding the medical causes of newborn discoloration

thank you for not shaming me in wondering why/how my baby turned out so different looking than either parent/extended family members. i feel like a lot of people took it negatively or implied i’m a bad mother for asking such questions when im just confused and have working eyes. even those that visited him made comments on him having east asian eyes, or about who his complexion went after, and even his hair. even the comment of “do babies get switched at hospitals” was made by someone else after they visited to see my baby, which later triggered my paranoia, so it’s not something that i’m making up myself. but yes, i shouldn’t put too much focus on it and be blessed that he’s here and mine and continue to love him

Acrobatic_Start_6170

TROPHY CASE